


Duo in Un-Marriage

by willowbilly



Category: The Terror (TV 2018)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Coming Out, Gen, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, Platonic Soulmates, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, in which Goodsir and Silna are gay and lesbian solidarity, to one other person, while privately conversing together inside of a literal closet
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-20
Updated: 2019-12-20
Packaged: 2021-02-26 02:35:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,226
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21866074
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/willowbilly/pseuds/willowbilly
Summary: “You...you're my soulmate,”Goodsir cannot help but say, observing this aloud at as low a volume as that at which he can keep himself. Propriety demands that a fuss not be made, but Harry Goodsir is amazed all the same, overwhelmed with mingled gratitude and confusion. “I'd never expected a woman as my soulmate, as I'd supposed to find a romantic soulmate, solely.” His voice, the whisper with which Goodsir has been speaking, gives out, then. He leans to check that Des Voeux has not heard anything and is relieved, fully reassured of Des Voeux's obliviousness, and now only worried for Silna's understanding, and for his own failure in his inability to politely ignore a fresh soulmate bond.During one of their language lessons, Goodsir and Silna learn something of each other.
Relationships: Harry D. S. Goodsir & Lady Silence | Silna
Comments: 9
Kudos: 46
Collections: The Terror Bingo (2019)





	Duo in Un-Marriage

**Author's Note:**

> For the "Free Space" square!

Lady Silna's language has terms for homosexuality. _Angutauqatigiik:_ “two hard things rubbing together,” as Silna explains, and _qaigajuariik,_ for two soft things rubbing together.

Goodsir discovers this during one of their language-learning sessions in the slops closet where Lady Silna is being kept under guard, following an earlier session wherein the Lady had disclosed to him her name, and from whom in her family it had been bequeathed to her, and how names functioned in an Inuktitut-speaking community in the first place.

Granted, given the language barrier between Inuktut and English, Goodsir's working knowledge of the _cultural_ barriers between their respective societies remains, as of yet, terribly scant, confined to scattershot theory surrounding presumed differences. But he has just enough of an understanding to have gathered that given names are passed on within Inuit communities, chosen by elders, and that in casual quotidian interactions nicknames are usually used in lieu of them. For this reason he avoids calling Silna by her given name even in private, as he is not a peer of hers, and wishes not to cause offense. He continues to address her as Lady Silence, and when she does call him anything she calls him Goodsir, as he had introduced himself.

She seems more at ease with him every day. Much of that, he's no doubt, would be due to their lessons constituting a welcome distraction from the dreary boredom which must surely plague her aboard _Erebus_. As Goodsir has been endeavoring to conduct himself in as gentlemanly and nonthreatening a manner as possible, Silna's fear of him has gradually thawed, and they have begun to converse. Captain Crozier is most eager for any information which might be gleaned regarding the creature, and while Goodsir has every intention of following up on the matter, he is conflicted in that he will not exert any undue pressure upon the innocent Lady to force her secrets from her, and especially not seeing as they are the ones to have murdered her father, the shaman. Not since she has begun to...if not _trust_ Goodsir, then to trust him enough to talk with him.

This leaves Goodsir their lessons. A fair portion is still spent in each attempting to divine what the other means to communicate, even with Goodsir supplementing his own studies by practicing his Inuktut with Mr. Blanky and Dr. M'Donald whenever such an interaction can be occasioned. The more notes of Lady Silna's Natsilik dialect which he compiles for the Inuktut dictionary, the clearer his amorphous grasp of Silna's life becomes, and the closer he is to learning the bear-creature's place in it. Sometimes this leads their conversations down eclectic paths, as he is so ill-versed in Inuit culture, and its most obvious customs and turns of phrase.

And so Goodsir blinks down at the two new additions to his notes and wonders what to make of them.

“Can these...can these be used for people, too?” he asks, tentatively, smoothing the page of the journal down with his fingertips as he indicates the line on which the Inuktut constructions in question are transcribed.

“Angutauqatigiik,” she repeats, nodding, and holds up two fingers.

“As it is in the dual, yes,” he says. “So...this would mean, ah, two men? Two male homosexuals?”

She nods again, a fond little tutor's smile gracing her lips in quiet pride of her pupil's passing acuity, and says, “Two men.”

Two men. Dual males, rubbing their hard things together. How very literal; not unlike _homosexual,_ he supposes, but there is, to his mind, a lovely descriptive poetry to one manner of putting things which other more scientific language lacks, as well as a graphic frankness common to the pragmatic aspect of the Arctic.

Despite himself Goodsir finds that he is blushing at the images he's inadvertently conjured, the heat crawling in profusion to his cheeks, and he resists the urge to touch his sidewhiskers to try and hide more of his face with his hand, instead tucking in his lower lip and biting it. He has never been skilled at hiding his thoughts, and when it comes to the feelings of the heart his skills at obfuscation are lesser yet. In debilitating addition, Goodsir is aware that he is too often oblivious to clues of social context, lest they be, of course, somehow contextualized with crustaceans, or another of his interests which allows him to absorb whatsoever it is which he will from the world. Goodsir cannot tell if Silna will see his blush or if she will realize the meaning behind it.

He supposes he's afraid, now, of being seen for what he is. And there is a very real danger in that, here where the Articles rule them and the darkness can incite paranoia and loathing in Goodsir's fellows.

Her firm hand on his fidgety one surprises him; he starts, and her grip slides down to gently encircle his wrist, their hands linked atop the journal perched on his knees. She uses her other hand to tilt the journal in his hand flatter, so that she may peer at the writing on the page with which he'd become fascinated.

It is the first time they have ever touched, and her hand is cool but leaves what is as an imprint of heat in its wake; it is color, Goodsir sees, the soul's color of first touch bleeding to life between them. Her hand has printed a soulmate mark upon him, of the most beautiful, inky indigo, and there it is settling, the oceanic color seeping into the dermis around Goodsir's wrist and down the back of his hand. Where Silna touches Goodsir, her hand is the same.

When he looks up at her, lifting his face to that of his newfound soulmate's, she lifts her eyes to his, marveling at him as he is her. It is as if he's been looking at her through a pane of grimy glass all this time and it has only now been removed from between them.

“You... _you're my soulmate,”_ Goodsir cannot help but say, observing this aloud at as low a volume as he can keep himself to. Propriety demands that a fuss not be made, but Harry Goodsir is amazed all the same, overwhelmed with mingled gratitude and confusion. “I'd never expected a woman as my soulmate, as I'd supposed to find a romantic soulmate, solely.” His voice, the whisper with which Goodsir has been speaking, gives out, then. He leans to check that Des Voeux has not heard anything and is relieved, fully reassured of Des Voeux's obliviousness, and now only worried for Silna's understanding, and for his own failure in his inability to politely ignore a fresh soulmate bond.

He has overheard some of the men calling him things because they suspect his sexual proclivities; Bryant had once made a mary-ann comment when he'd supposed Goodsir gone and the men certainly hadn't disputed it. Though Goodsir has not faced any outright hostility, as that which is possibly assumed to be an effeminate behavior or characteristic is not, as is sodomy, a punishable offense, and Goodsir is furthermore actually much liked by the crew, occasional snicker at his expense or not.

It does not bother him as much as it ought that his nature should be so easy to suspect; were he heterosexual, Goodsir would have his own personality all the same, and would likely behave as he ever has. It is not worth castigating himself over. But he wonders if Lady Silna understands this of him. If she has picked up what others might.

“Soulmate,” says Silna, testing the word on her tongue. “You are my soulmate; we are soulmates.” A smile breaks across her face as she studies Goodsir in the wake of this revelation. That of this supposed biological or metaphysical link of compatibility which has just been signaled as existing between them.

The light febrility which is the body's normal reaction to the formation of a soulmate mark is setting in, Silna's cheeks and eyes bright with it, and Goodsir finds himself rather faint. Woozy, as well as astonished, and in awe that it should be Lady Silence, of all people, and on this expedition, of all times. But if she does not understand, he is afraid of breaking her heart for not being the person of her dreams. The Inuit have soulmate marks, too, as do all humans in all cultures, and perhaps Silna had longed for the acquisition of a romantic partner via a mark.

 _He_ had.

Before meeting _her._

“I've...never wanted a _wife_ _—_ a-a, a nuliaq,” Goodsir says to Silna, even more softly, for these words are a vulnerability between them, something which still takes bravery for him to articulate to another. He is not ashamed of who he is, but he is fearful of how others might act for who he is, and he's always feared this. Though Harry Goodsir has feared others' actions regarding him about most all things, were he to be honest. It is second nature to fear. But it is first nature to be himself. To declare one's stance.

And, he realizes, he trusts Lady Silna to be kind toward him, and to keep confidence. Perhaps Goodsir is falling into the same biases as led the seamen to leave little trinkets and offerings at her door, as if in appeasing tribute. As if she were as much confidante to them as the shadows of the ship's hold were, as if she, rumored sorceress, were Confessoress to any of them at all. Lady Silna had perforce been forced to listen to their murmured disclosures, whatever apologies or otherwise which they'd made as they backed away to where she could not follow, and it was too late for Goodsir to convincingly recant his own.

But he has found her, a _soulmate_ of his. Goodsir wants more than anything to bare his heart to her.

“Uinigumasuittunga,” Silna says, with a song or the lilt of a laugh underneath. _Uinik-,_ or “to take an _uik,”_ with “-guma-” for “to want,” “-suit-” for “seldom ever,” and the first-person post-consonant ending: Silna had never wanted to take a husband. _Uinigumasuittuq,_ Goodsir recalls, was also a name by which Nuliajuk the sea spirit went.

“You, neither?” he asks Silna. “I've always felt...”

Mr. Des Voeux is buried deep in his novel, and out of earshot so long as Goodsir and Silna continue to keep their voices down. As Goodsir pauses and leans to peek out the gap in the door, Mr. Des Voeux, reclining with his legs crossed at the ankles, finishes turning one of the pages of his book, and then visibly settles in with a little shuffle of his shoulders against the wall to more comfortably resume his reading. Apparently the two of them do not pose as interesting enough of an object for eavesdropping as they had initially.

“I've never felt inclined towards women,” Goodsir confides in a rush, leaning back to her. “I still don't, and I know I never will. I'll never want to marry a woman. Is it so odd, to never want to be married to the opposite, the hetero, sex? To never want...to only want to be one half of angutauqatigiik?”

“Goodsir,” she says, to shush him, and she takes her hand from his wrist to tap herself on the chest, now smiling like an indulgent tutor with an amusingly slow pupil. For a second he feels the absence of her touch like an ache. “Uvanga, as well. Uvangaptauq.”

“Oh. _Oh,_ qaigajuariit? Or—qaigajuaq? That's you?” Goodsir asks.

Silna nods with steady self-assurance, warmth in her dark brown eyes. She then confides in _him,_ saying something to the effect of having begged her father not to marry her off, and her father having promised her this when Silna was very young, even before he had decided to teach her the ways and responsibilities of an angatkuq, because she used to cry at the thought of being required as a wife to accept a man as her husband. The touch of men, she said, with a playful wrinkle of her nose and a tiny shake of her head, was not to her liking. Not as that of a woman would be.

There is no delicate way to ask Silna if she behaves more in what would be perceived as a masculine or more a feminine manner, for her culture, as is Goodsir's first clumsy instinct. He wants to ask her a hundred thousand questions, to compare their experiences and therefore bond, but this might very well be intrusive even in Nunavut, as it would be in Britain. It is also beside the point as well as rude, and so Goodsir doesn't, instead opting to broach the subject of angatkuuniq so as to strive for the fulfillment of Crozier's directive, sensing shamanism to relate, somehow, back to the bear, but this also leads to Silna's being reminded of her father and thereby encourages only her grieving reticence, and she draws away. Eventually, after he has apologized and offered further condolences, they both retire for the evening.

Goodsir stays awake late, marveling at the soulmate mark in the lamplight, covering it with his own hand and imagining everything which its being there might mean. He thinks of her and knows he is not alone.

**Author's Note:**

> -angatkuq: shaman  
>  -angatkuuniq: the practice of shamanism  
>  -angutauqatigiik: a gay couple  
>  -Natsilingmiutut: the dialect of the Natsilingmiut/Netsilik Inuit  
>  -qaigajuariik: a lesbian couple  
>  -qaigajuariit: lesbians (plural)  
>  -qaigajuaq: a best guess at "lesbian (singular)" (so don't trust that one)  
>  -uvanga: first person pronoun  
>  -uvangaptauq: "me, too"
> 
> Some Resources:  
>  -[tusaalanga.ca](https://tusaalanga.ca/node/2502)  
>  -[uqausiit.ca](https://uqausiit.ca/)  
>  -[This news article](https://nunatsiaq.com/stories/article/65674gay_in_nunavut_discovering_a_new_language/) is where I found the self-descriptors "angutauqatigiik" and "qaigajuariik" (perhaps not the same terminology as'd actually be in Natsiliŋmiutut but it is What I Got)  
>  -If you're up for it go watch the doc [Two Soft Things, Two Hard Things](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gd56h-xAlsg) bc (I did and I liked it lol, and) it got me to wondering how such a conversation between these two might play out.
> 
> [“Uinigumahuittunga,” Silna says, with a song or the lilt of a laugh underneath. _Uinik-,_ or “to take an _uik,”_ with “-guma-” for “to want,” “-huit-” for “seldom ever,” and the first-person post-consonant ending: Silna has almost never wanted to take a husband. _Uinigumasuittuq,_ Goodsir recalls, was also a name by which Nuliajuk the sea goddess went, with an _s_ in place of the Nattilingmiutut _h_ phoneme.] _Edited this out bc in rewatching the show I think the area's subdialect dialect at this time has /h/ in some Roots (like the noun_ hila: _air; outside) but actually still has /s/ in what I heard of the verb infixes? So I hope this is right! Also changed "Nattilik" to "Natsilik" bc maybe the /ts/ hadn't been palatalized into the double-t "tch" sound bc Heterogenous Consonant Clusters on that side of the map at that time mebbe BABEY._


End file.
